This invention is a corner protector for use in the shipping of an item, such as furniture or a speaker cabinet, which when applied to the corners of the item being shipped and placed in a shipping carton protects the corners of the item and holds the item intact during shipment.
Before this invention, corner protectors made of several layers of corrugated material construction, corner protectors of a single face laminated built-up construction, or a corner protector made of a pre-formed molded synthetic resin foam construction, had been applied to the corners of items such as furniture or speaker cabinets for shipping protection. In the case of the layered corrugated material, the item frequently broke or was damaged when dropped, due to its high rate of energy transfer. The latter two corners had a tendency to crush or break during shipment thus resulting in the item being loose inside the shipping container and leaving it vulnerable to further damage. When this happened, the stacking capability of the loosened items within their shipping container was diminished. There has been a need for a corner protector which could balance the importance of noncrushability and low energy transfer, be relatively inexpensive, and could be shipped in a spaced saving configuration (flat) for use, all of which are represented by this invention.